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Comcast put a hard cap on its customer's Internet usage this week. The average user may be initially shocked to find out you can't just downloador uploadas much as you want, but the truth is that Comcast's limits won't affect the average userat least not right now. This cap does represent a major shift in the broadband industry, a shift that should concern casual browsers and power users alike. But putting the larger issue of Net neutrality aside for a moment, I just don't think my mother and I should pay the same rate for Internet usage.

My mom has a cable modem. She hits the Web every day to get news, forward inspirational e-mails, and send me photos of the latest varmint or reptile that has wandered into her backyard in Tucson, Arizona. I doubt she reaches 1MB of data per day.

I have a cable modem too, but my usage looks a lot different. When I'm home, I'm constantly online, blogging, writing, and sending files and high-resolution artwork back and forth to my coworkers here at PCMag.com. I also download music, videos, and podcasts from iTunes, grab old TV shows from BitTorrent, stream movies through Netflix, and I've recently started playing Warhawk with others online on my PlayStation 3. All are bandwidth-intensive applications. On a busy weeknight, I could blow through a few gigabytes of traffic, easy. On weekends: much, much more.

No reasonable person would say that my mom and I should pay the same price for our service. It's a fundamental issue of fairness. We both want our Web pages to load quickly, but we aren't using anything close to the same service. In fact, I already pay Optimum more to get my "enhanced" 20-megabit-per-second cable connection instead of the standard 10-Mbps connection. If I want to use my system as a multimedia server to distribute content across the globe, I don't have a problem paying a few bucks more than my mom, since she's just using her connection for e-mail and light surfing.

Of course, I would like know exactly what I'm getting for my money. And ISPs have been a bit dodgy on that issue.

As of today, Comcast is officially limiting usage for its 12.9 million customers, but the company has been doing this quietly since 2005. The difference is, for all those years no one knew what the "magic cap" was until Comcast came calling to tell you that you'd gone over. If after that you continued to exceed the secret cap, the company cancelled your service. Now, thanks to an FCC sanction this summer, we have a number. And that number is 250GB per month.

250GB is pretty generous, actually. Especially when compared with the pricing scheme that Time Warner is testing in Beaumont, Texas. There, the caps start as low as 5GB, which goes for $30 a month. For $55 per month you get 40GB. After that every extra gigabyte you use in a month costs you a buck. Not cheap, but it does seem clear that we need a new pricing scheme for Internet access. The one we have now just doesn't make sense. Metering access deserves a chance.Next: WiMAX XOHM Network >

Dan Costa is the Editor-in-Chief of PCMag.com and the Senior Vice President of Content for Ziff-Davis. He oversees the editorial operations for PCMag.com, Geek.com, ExtremeTech.com as well as PCMag's network of blogs, including AppScout and SecurityWatch. Dan makes frequent appearances on local, national, and international news programs, including CNN, MSNBC, FOX, ABC, and NBC where he shares his perspective on a variety of technology trends.
Dan began working at PC Magazine in 2005 as a senior editor, covering consumer electronics, blogging on Gearlog.com, and serving as...
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